I was so smug because unlike several of my equally new collegues I didn't fall for the usual Mech.Eng. hazings of "Go to the stores and ask them for a long weight!" or "Quick! Get me a left-handed screw-driver!".

Of course, when I went all through the palava of traipsing to the stores, filling out the appropriate requisitions in triplicate, being sent upstairs to get signatures from my bosses boss, and then upstairs again for the same from his boss.

Returning to the stores and having to wait while they arranged for a security guard to escort me back from the central stores to my workshop with this "highly specialised and valuable" piece of equipement.

Getting back to my workshop and being told to remove the 'metric' vernier protractor from its polished wooden box and being asked to explain to the (now assembled) mass of collegues the exact differences between this and the common imperial vernier protractor, I was somewhat red-faced.

In fact, I still feel myself flush slightly whenever I think about it.